New pint glasses will be made to measure

Published on Saturday 7 February 2009 18:32

DRINKERS will soon be able to count exactly how many units they have drunk with the launch of a new type of pint glass.

Guinness is set to become the first beer brewers to issue a branded glass that tells drinkers how many units they are consuming.

Bars have been supplied with 500,000 branded glasses which carry a unit count. Full to the brim, each glass contains 2.3 units.

John Roscoe, marketing director for Guinness UK, part of the Diageo drinks group, said the innovation would help drinkers "get a better grasp on the amount of alcohol they are consuming".

Official advice is that men should not regularly drink more than three or four units of alcohol per day. Women should not consume more than two to three units per day.

The move was welcomed by the Scottish Government, which is taking its own action to crack down on Scotland's drink problem.

Kenny MacAskill, the Justice Minister, has called for a ban on selling off-sales alcohol to under-21s and a minimum pricing policy.

Yesterday MacAskill's spokesman said: "It is a good idea to do something that raises awareness of these issues and gives people information about how much they are drinking.

"We do have a problem with binge-drinking, but Scotland's drink problem is far wider than just that, so anything that educates people and makes them think about how much they are drinking has to be welcomed."

UK Government research last year revealed that only 57% of the drinks industry gave information on the number of units in cans and bottles.

The charity Alcohol Concern hailed the glasses as a "fantastic idea".